Proceedings Article | 22 September 2003
Proc. SPIE. 5071, Sensors, and Command, Control, Communications, and Intelligence (C3I) Technologies for Homeland Defense and Law Enforcement II
KEYWORDS: Unmanned aerial vehicles, Sensors, Computer simulations, Sensor networks, Wireless communications, Data communications, Computer architecture, Network architectures, Device simulation, Unattended ground sensors
With the number of small, inexpensive Unmanned Air Vehicles (UAVs) increasing, it is feasible to build multi-UAV sensing networks. In particular, by using UAVs in conjunction with unattended ground sensors, a degree of persistent sensing can be achieved. With proper UAV cooperation algorithms, sensing is maintained even though exceptional events, e.g., the loss of a UAV, have occurred. In this paper a cooperation architecture is described that allows multiple UAVs to perform coordinated, persistent sensing with unattended ground sensors over a wide area. This architecture automatically adapts the UAV paths so that on the average, the amount of time that any sensor has to wait for a UAV revisit is minimized. We also describe the Simulation, Tactical Operations and Mission Planning (STOMP) software. STOMP is designed to help simulate and operate
distributed sensor networks where multiple UAVs are used to
collect data.
